Cisco SRP527W. Does Anyone have any reviews or experience?

Forums › LAN (ethernet/Wifi/routers/Bluetooth) › Cisco SRP527W. Does Anyone have any reviews or experience?

hairy1

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#66327 17-Aug-2010 10:19

Hi folks.

I am looking at the Srp527 but cannot find any reviews or opinions.

Does anyone have anything good or bad to say about this router?

How is the wireless range? to was pretty disappointed with the wireless range on my wrp400.

Am looking to replace my WRP400 with this for naked ADSL and SIP.

Cheers, Matt.

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Oldhat

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#368708 17-Aug-2010 15:20

Hi Matt,

I haven't used a WRP400 and so can't really give you a comparison with that device.

I haven't had the rosiest introduction to Cisco routers though, having only purchased the SRP527w approximately three weeks ago. Running the supplied 1.01.09 firmware resulted in the router requiring a reboot after three days uptime and after updating to .11 I managed 10 days before the same issue required a reboot.

I have been advised that Cisco Support are actively seeking a resolution for this.

Wireless signal strength appears to be on a par with some other good wireless performers I have used ( Netgear 834, 3Com 101a-75 and Belkin N1 ). There is no support for WDS though which is a bit of a shame.

Logging appears to be fairly rudimentary and no Syslog support.

Some of the nice features are the USB port specifically for failover to wireless and the two VoIP ports.

hairy1

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#369035 18-Aug-2010 07:59

Thanks Oldhat.

What were the reboots due to? Logging has never been Linksys / Cisco's strong points with their consumer routers. As this router seems to be targeting small enterprise I would have expected a bulletproof router.

Are you using the VOIP ports?

Cheers,

Matt.

My views (except when I am looking out their windows) are not those of my employer.

freitasm

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#369038 18-Aug-2010 08:04

I have been using the SRP521W, basically the cable modem version of this router. I started using it for WorldxChange as part of their testing for the VFX VoIP service.

I am using both port (one with VFX, the second with mynetfone AU) and they have much better voice quality than previously (I used to run a Linksys SPA2102 plugged to a Linksys DR router).

I haven't rebooted mine for any specific reason - the only problem I found was that if the WAN came down for any reason the router would restart itself up to three or four times before coming solid.

3G fall back works as designed, and using the Telecom Sierra Wireless 885 card it's solid.

Good features are the ability to configure multiple virtual LANs, so you can have multiple logical networks. Haven't played with QoS though since it's all preconfigured.

Oldhat

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#369189 18-Aug-2010 11:21

Hi Matt,

Basically the router stops responding to standard internet traffic and the DHCP server stops functioning. Applications using high port ranges still function fine, but there is no access on primary ports like 80, 443 and the various email ports.

I have had uptime of 10 days and 6 days before this has occurred and a restart has been required.

I too had thought with the target market it would have been bullet proof. Hopefully there is just a few bad apples around and mine is one of them :-)

I haven't tested the VoIP side out, but I would imagine that side would be the same as Mauricio's SRP521w.

hairy1

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#369191 18-Aug-2010 11:24

Thanks guys. Will pick one up and see how it goes. The WRP400 has been pretty good but will be changing to Vodafone naked DSL from wireless so need a modem.

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maverick

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#370565 21-Aug-2010 08:13

Oldhat: Hi Matt,

Basically the router stops responding to standard internet traffic and the DHCP server stops functioning. Applications using high port ranges still function fine, but there is no access on primary ports like 80, 443 and the various email ports.

I have had uptime of 10 days and 6 days before this has occurred and a restart has been required.

I too had thought with the target market it would have been bullet proof. Hopefully there is just a few bad apples around and mine is one of them :-)

I haven't tested the VoIP side out, but I would imagine that side would be the same as Mauricio's SRP521w.

Just saw this thread, have a question for you. Do you a VOIP line configured ?, if so what do you have set in the restrict source ip field ?

Yes I am a employee of WxC (My Profile) ... but I do have my own opinions as well

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Oldhat

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#370813 21-Aug-2010 21:57

maverick:
Oldhat: Hi Matt,

Basically the router stops responding to standard internet traffic and the DHCP server stops functioning. Applications using high port ranges still function fine, but there is no access on primary ports like 80, 443 and the various email ports.

I have had uptime of 10 days and 6 days before this has occurred and a restart has been required.

I too had thought with the target market it would have been bullet proof. Hopefully there is just a few bad apples around and mine is one of them :-)

I haven't tested the VoIP side out, but I would imagine that side would be the same as Mauricio's SRP521w.

Just saw this thread, have a question for you. Do you a VOIP line configured ?, if so what do you have set in the restrict source ip field ?

I don't have a VoIP line configured, but your question does have me intrigued.

Checking the settings for "Voice" I could only find a reference to "Restricted Access Domains" and nothing related to the source IP field you mentioned. If this is the same field, then I currently have that blank.

Many thanks for pointing me into that area though, as I found the default "IVR" password and have now changed that to something four times better. Quite a timely reminder with the current spate of PABX hacks.

Sharesies

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maverick

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#371000 22-Aug-2010 13:06

under Line 1 & 2 there is sip settings

This is the parameter you are looking for,
Restrict Source IP:

If this is set to No and your VOIP lines are enabled then quite possibly it is outside traffic that could be casuing this, with the amount of SIP fraud attempts going on out there there is a huge increase in SIP scans, your device will respond to sip request if thius is not set to yes, these brute force attacks that could come will effect the device in the way you descibe, I know I have tested this unit for that and had it come under an attack, I was waiting for it to capture from an outside source, it happened within 4 hours.

This is one of the reasons we like to control the settings on our VoIP devices, this one little parameter can have a very big impact.

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Oldhat

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#371304 23-Aug-2010 01:41

Thanks for that little gem, as this was set to "no".

It would be great if all the router needed was that minor change to "resolve" my problem.

It still makes me wonder why manufacturers of these devices don't have them set up more securely by default. Personally, I would prefer having a secure device and the ability to make it less secure rather than the current trend of supplying them as open as they are.

Cheers :-)